


Playing It Safe

by writernotwaiting



Series: Just Graduated [3]
Category: Unrelated (2007)
Genre: F/M, Feels, Fluff and Smut, Fluffy Smut, Jealousy, Love Triangle, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-09
Updated: 2015-07-09
Packaged: 2018-04-08 10:46:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4301757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writernotwaiting/pseuds/writernotwaiting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Decisions must be made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Playing It Safe

**Author's Note:**

> Three points if you can find and ID the Shakespeare quote.

> _“I mean it, Palmer.”_
> 
> _“What?” She couldn’t help but smile more widely when she looked into those gorgeous eyes — for once earnest._
> 
> _“I’ll play by whatever rules you want,” and he leaned in for a long, slow, breath-stealingly heart-stopping kiss._

 

Jean blinked once or twice as she processed what Oakley had said, her mood shifting from lazy contentment to something more serious. “Well, Oakley, you’re going to have to decide what exactly it is you want here,” more than slightly distrustful.

He sighed and screwed up the side of his mouth nervously at that, but didn’t answer.

“Let’s be realistic,” she continued. “You’ve graduated. In three months you’re moving away for grad school, which means you won’t just be hundreds of miles away, but you’ll be too poor to travel, and you’ll be up to your eyeballs in work. This is not a recipe for a healthy relationship.”

His gaze had shifted away from hers to focus instead on his fingers as they traced a lazy pattern across her collarbone.

She smiled a bit sadly as she continued, trying hard not to sound like the cynical divorcee she suddenly felt like. “Contrary to popular belief, absence does not make the heart grow fonder, especially if the heart has a history of avoiding commitment.” She bobbed her head try and catch his eye, but he just scowled, refusing to look up. She waited for him to gather his thoughts a bit, then asked again, “What do you really want here?”

He sighed again.

“Honestly?” His eyes briefly flicked up to hers before fixing elsewhere once more. “Honestly, I don’t know what I want. I didn’t really think I would get this far.” He smirked a bit at the admission.

“Ah,” she nodded, frowning. “So that thing last week was what? A challenge? Counting coup?”

He shook his head, but Jean’s ex had used up an awful lot of her Benefit-of the-Doubt reserve. Her voice took on a harder edge than she intended, “Was it meant to be a one-off after all?”

“No,” he rushed in to explain. “I didn’t want to it to be a one off — I just didn’t really think it would work. You’re, well, . . . you can be a little intimidating, you know.”

She snorted, “intimidating? Me?”

“Yeah. Do you know you’re the only professor to ever give me a B? Ever.”

“Well, you deserved it — you never work up to potential. You’ve made sliding by into an art form.”

“See? That’s what I’m talking about. You just aren’t like anybody else. So, yeah, I’ve wanted to . . . you know . . . for ages, but I didn’t really think it would ever happen. I thought for sure you would just toss me out and call me an asshole. I never thought about what would happen after.”

Jean propped herself up on her elbow and leaned in for a quick kiss, “I guess you better start thinking then, hadn’t you?” _And I suppose I had better start thinking, too — preparing myself, anyway._

One rueful smile and lingering caress later, she sat up and started looking around for her clothes, pulling things on as she wandered back into the kitchen to look for a snack. “Do you want anything?”

Oakley pulled his shorts back on and followed her out, “What have you got?”

Just then her phone pinged, and she glanced at the message that popped up. She smiled and called over her shoulder, “Well, Oakley, it looks like you and I have a bit of a reprieve.”

“What do you mean?”

“Dr. Ryan just sent me a note —“ and she smiled indulgently, “He says he forgot that he has to go out of town on Friday. He promised his research assistant he would drive out to the field and check on the bee hives. He won’t be back for a couple of weeks.”

She met him in the kitchen doorway and wrapped her arms about his waist. “That gives you — both of us, I suppose — at least 14 days to think about things.”

****

Yes, well, two weeks of reprieve turned into two weeks of denial. Okay, denial and some excellent calisthenics, but denial, nonetheless. They attempted to bring up the issue several times, but as neither really wanted to face what seemed like the inevitable, the conversation always flagged, or else they allowed themselves to get distracted.

Saturday morning, the sun shining through the curtains Jean propped herself up on her elbow and stared at the lovely curls snoozing on the pillow next to her. She sighed heavily. _This has really got to stop — I am not going to delude myself into another mistake like the last one. I have to stop it._

And over breakfast she did, sort of.

“Oakley, Dr Ryan is going to be back in the lab Monday.”

*Heavy sigh*

“Have _you_ come to any grand conclusions?”

*Extra heavy sigh*

Hands ran through the golden halo of bedhead.

Another sigh accompanied by a melancholy look. _Oh! You aren’t about to make this any easier for me, are you?_

“You know I’m right, Oakley.”

Oakley’s eyebrow crept up, “Right about what?”

“You won’t be able to keep this up after you start grad school.”

His mouth drew itself into a thin line, “How do you know that?”

“I just know. Call it learning from experience.”

Silence.

Oakley’s face hardened just a bit.

_Jesus, you’re going to hate me, aren’t you?_

His eyes narrowed as he stared her down. “So that’s it, then?” was all he managed to spit out.

Jean moved to caress his cheek, and he jerked away. “Oh Sweetheart.” It was really the only thing she could think to say. Her chest tightened as she watched his jaw work to keep control of his face.

She could almost smell his resentment.

She screwed up her face and drew her eyebrows together. “I know it sucks. Life is full of choices, and sometimes all of them are bad.” _And I know your type, Hun. I’m not going to get left twice for some young trophy blond. Been there. Done that._

His eyes remained angry and bitter, “I’d feel a hell of a lot better about it if I were the one making them.”

He pushed himself away from the little table and gathered his stuff together in silence as she watched, shooting her one last look of resentment before he closed the door.

“Well,” she chided herself, “that could have gone better.”

*****

For the next week, Jean and Oakley played The Avoidance Game with some success, so that by the weekend, Jean felt relatively unbruised, and only slightly guilty, when she accepted John’s invitation for a movie at his place.

“You know,” John turned sideways and threw his right arm over the back of the couch to face her, “I didn’t even realize you’d gotten a divorce. How long ago was that?”

Jean smiled, turning on the couch and mimicking his body language as the credits rolled on some forgettable movie, and the only light came from a hallway lamp. “Two years ago, where have you been?”

He blushed — _so cute!_ — “I try to stay away from the gossip pipeline. I have too many other things to think about.”

Jean sat on John’s big, smooshy couch as she polished off a second (third?) glass of wine, and he nursed a beer (number unknown). There was a bit of a pause in the conversation as he stopped to admire Jean’s big, brown eyes and soft curves, her legs folded up underneath her, their hands almost-but-not-quite touching.

Then she frowned as an uncharitable thought occurred to her, “So how did you find out, then?” _If Oakley’s said something, I will beat his sorry behind — I don’t care if he is twice my size_. But John laughed as he remembered.

“Oh a couple of girls in Zoology have apparently decided you and some new guy in the School of Ed would make a cute couple.”

She snorted. “Oh really? What did you say to that?”

“I told them that you were married to some smarmy guy in Business — what’s his name?”

“Alan Wasson . . . Smarmy, huh?”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t say that, I just thought it.” He smiled broadly. “What’s he teach?”

“Internet marketing.”

“Oh yeah, right, marketing — that kind of reinforces the smarmy part,” he said with a twinkle. “Any way, they said that you’d kind of caught him out, or something, and you’d moved out.”

Jean made a face that looked like she’d bitten into an green crabapple, “Yeah, apparently the gal in the front office was working on her MRS degree.”

“Ah.” He sobered a little at that. “Smarminess confirmed, then.”

“Indeed.”

Another long paused followed this declaration, neither entirely sure what to do next, though they both had some ideas as where they wanted it to end. Jean started to pick at the nap on the couch’s fabric until John’s hand moved to slowly caress the back of hers. Her eyes moved up to meet his as his fingers slowly curled around to catch hers in a loose grasp and softly caress her knuckles. _Oh my god I can’t breathe._

He leaned closer, gaze moving between her eyes and lips, then back again.

Pause.

He waited for a reaction.

Her face flushed, and her eyes turned into dark pools a man could drown in.

A rush of air left her lungs as he hung there waiting.

He smiled.

She blinked.

He moved in and slowly, tortuously, touched her lips with his own. A tiny little sigh came out of her without her even knowing where it had come from. It was enough of a yes, and he leaned in the rest of the way, opening his own mouth to capture her own with an impossibly soft insistence that she felt all the way to her toes.

The hands at the back of the couch soon locked tightly together, while her free hand made its way to caress his cheek and then tangle in his hair. She felt his hand slide onto her knee, then move up to rest mid-thigh, his thumb slowly tracing circles that sent a wave of sparks through her middle. She pulled back just enough to gulp in a couple of breaths and lock onto his eyes as they shifted back and forth between her own.

“Do you think this is a smart thing to do?” she asked. “I mean, your lab is just around the corner from my office. If we fuck up, it could get really uncomfortable.”

His tenor came back silky smooth, “I’m prepared to take that risk. You?”

Her “yeah” emerged from as barely an exhalation of warmth and she nodded. A slow smile turned up the corner of his mouth, migrated its way up his face, crinkled his cheeks, and settled as a sparkler in his eyes. It felt like the sun had come out, and Jean moved closer to soak up that warmth, touching his lips once more with her own, opening herself and inviting him in, while seeking him out in return. She inhaled deeply to take in his scent while they kissed. Her hand moved to his neck and her thumb lazily traced the shell of his ear. His hand moved with equal deliberation from her thigh, up over her ribs, and to her back as he pulled her closer.

They were neither of them in a hurry.

He took his time as his mouth left hers to trace a warm, wet trail across the line of her jaw, up to nibble a bit right where it met her neck, and then down to her collarbone.

She slid her right hand to his shoulder, and held tightly to him with her left, angling her head to invite his explorations.

John extricated his fingers from hers to work her buttons free and open her shirt before pushing her back and down onto the cushions, “God, Jean, your husband was such an idiot — how could he possibly choose to leave this.”

She giggled, “I’m pretty sure my boobs are not wondrous enough to tie someone to me for all eternity.”

“Maybe not, but you are a package deal, sweetheart; the boobs are pretty fantastic, but the woman they’re attached to? Damn, I wouldn’t trade you in, that’s for sure.”

“Oh my god, if that’s a line, I really don’t want to know, because you’ve just earned yourself a whole heap of brownie points.”

She pulled his face down and kissed him fiercely while his hands explored her skin, and played with the lace of her bra. When they finally broke for air, his caresses increased in their intensity, pulling a breast free of its lace, and teasing the nipple before he kissed and sucked his way down her neck, then down her chest and replaced his fingers with his lips. She threw her shoulders back and lifted slightly off the couch, urging, her breath coming faster and he moved to tease her other nipple first through the lace and then pushing under the cup with his tongue to reach her flesh.

Her hips moved with a mind of their own, pressing up against his hand that now cupped between her legs, kneading her over the seam of her jeans until she groaned desperately.

Her own hands fumbled until they found the hem of his shirt, “This has got to go,” she whispered.

It went.

“And these, too,” he countered, tugging at the top of her denim.

“Yes.”

They went, too. Along with the bit of lace that has masqueraded as underwear.

Just at that point he stopped. She whined a bit as his pause. He ran his eyes over her, top to bottom, “Good lord, Jean, you’re gorgeous.”

She bit her lip and flashed him a lascivious smirk, “You’re not so bad yourself, mister, and you’re still overdressed.”

“Can’t have that, can we?”

Once he’d made quick work of his own tattered jeans, he moved over top of her once more, rubbing his hardness over her warm slickness, closing his eyes as he hovered over her, pulling soft moans from deep inside her that ended as tiny whimpers of need.

These broke off at a sudden realization, “Do you have any . . .?”

He smiled, “I was feeling optimistic,” and he pulled the little package from beneath the couch.

Oh, and when he finally, tortuously eased himself into her, when she keened out her pleasure, when she moved her fingers between the two of them as he increased his pace, the noises that came out of her were almost inhuman. Their intensity now matched the gentleness with which they had begun. Her hips rose to slam into his. His arms strained with effort as he held himself above her, meeting her need, and extracted every bit of pleasure he possibly could.

When he finally lowered himself down on top of her, their lips met once more. They tasted each other’s sweat as a tiny drop fell from his forehead onto hers.

She giggled once more, “Oh that was glorious fun.” And she stole another kiss as she ran her hands over his shoulders.

He rolled to the side and eased his arm beneath her neck for a snuggle, “Mmm, yes. I could definitely do that again.”

*****

Several weeks passed in relative calm. Jean started working more and more at home in order to avoid running into Oakley in the halls. Oakley studiously avoided wandering down the hall past Jean’s office. They seemed to have reached a non-aggression pact.

Seemed to.

Bang. Bang. Bang. “Palmer! Open the door.”

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Jean forced her eyes open, and wearily looked around her — _couch. living room. book. Right, I fell asleep on the couch again. What the hell time is it?_

Bang. Bang. Bang. “Open up, Palmer, I can see your light’s on.”

_Shit — is that Oakley?_

“Keep it down; you’ll wake up my neighbors!” She pulled herself up to a sitting position and then shuffled over to the door to look through the peephole. _Yup, Oakley._

She drew back the locks and opened the door. “Jesus, Oakley, what are you doing here? What time is it?”

“I don’t know. Late.” He leaned in close and gave her a big, wet, sloppy kiss, and Jean drew back abruptly, pushing at his chest with both hands.

“Phew — you smell like a hungover fraternity at a tobacco auction. Where’ve you been? And what did you do to your eye?” It was swollen, and sported a nasty looking cut underneath.

“Cavern, where else?” He tried to lean in again, and she backed away.

“No, stop, Oakley, really. You should go home.”

“Aw man, no, I can’t. Joe took my keys.”

“Good for him.” Then she realized what that meant. “You mean you walked here?”

“Yeah — your place is closer. Thought I’d say hi.” He gave her a lopsided grin, “Hi!” Then he winced as the grin flexed over his wound.

Jean pulled him over to the couch and pushed him down. “Good lord, what am I supposed to do with you?”

“I can think of a few things,” he smirked again and wrapped his hands around her ass to pull her crotch into his face.

“No, sweetheart, not like this. You’re drunk.” She grabbed his wrists and extricated herself as he got a pouty look on his face. “Awww. C’mon.”

“No and no.” She looked over at her clock. “It’s three in the morning, and you’re as drunk as Hemingway on a bender. ‘Love makes not up in such conditions.’ Here. Lie down. I’ll get you some water, and an icepack. I suppose you can crash here.” She pushed him down, and his muscles were really too rubbery to protest. By the time she came back out, he’d passed out.

_What the hell, Oakley? We were done weeks ago. Why did you even come here?_

She set the glass on the end table and turned him on his side in case he started puking. She left the ice pack in a dish next to the water. “At least they took your keys away. I’m glad someone has some sense.” She shook her head as she turned out the light.

It was well past noon before he finally groaned and started to show signs of life.

“Jesus. Where am I?” He slowly shifted on the couch, squinted about with one eye, and then covered his face with a throw pillow. “Ow ow ow ow.”

Jean threw him a disgusted look from the dining room table where she had been working. “Good afternoon, Oakley. Are you ready to join the land of the living, yet?”

A groan issued from underneath the pillow. “Shit. How did I end up here?”

“Apparently you walked. Do you not remember? You told me Joe took away your keys.”

“Right.” He hugged the pillow tighter to his head. “Do you have any ibuprofen? Ow! And maybe an ice pack?”

“Sure.”

When she came back out with the bottle and a new bag of ice, Oakley slowly hauled himself into some semblance of a sitting position. He flashed her a weak smile in gratitude and downed the painkillers.

“Would you like some toast? Or is it still too early to think about that?”

“Toast would be great, thanks.” He scrubbed his face to get the sleep out of his head, winced as he accidentally brushed the bruise on his cheek, but stayed put as she headed into the kitchen.

When she returned with the plate, she sat heavily in the chair next to the couch and watched him for a while as he slowly crunched, head bowed and propped up by the hand holding the ice.

“Why did you come here, Oakley?”

He didn’t answer right away. She could see him blink as the wheels turned slowly in his head.

“Joe took my keys. You’re place was closer.”

“You could have gone to Joe’s.”

Long pause.

“What happened?”

“I broke his nose. I think.”

“Ah. Because he took your keys?”

He hesitated a bit before he answered, “I think so.”

“Very logical of you.” He shot her a nasty look and went back to his toast.

Jean’s mouth settled into a thin line of a frown as she watched him. “Why did you really hit him, Oakley, and why are you here? You can’t tell me there aren’t half a dozen other places you could have crashed last night.”

He paused again before answering.

“mmrphmble.”

“What did you say?”

“He said you’d been staying over at Ryan’s place.”

“And that’s why you hit him?”

“ _And_ he’d taken my keys.”

“So Joe keeps you from killing yourself, tells you something that you probably already suspected, and then you hit him? Are you stupid?”

“Don’t you start in on me, too.”

“What the hell? What gives you the right to give a happy rat’s ass where I’m spending my nights? Or my days, for that matter?”

“Ow!” He winced as her voice rose. She was’t feeling terribly sympathetic.

“Maybe you should get a bit of help for those anger management issues.”

He looked up at that one, finger pointing at her chest, “Oh don’t you get all self-righteous on me; you sound exactly like my mother with her flavor-of-the-day boyfriends — you’re all ‘wounded’” (and he put a pair a exaggerated air quotes around the word) “because your asshole husband cheated on you. I never had a fucking chance.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Just because your ex walked out on you, you think any decent-looking guy must be on the make. You only like Ryan because he’s ‘safe’,” and the air quotes came back out. “Now you get all holier-than-thou because I’m a little resentful about having you make my decisions for me.”

She jumped to her feet at that. “You’re a fucking asshole, Oakley! If that’s all you can say for yourself, you had better get the hell out of my house.”

“Fine!” He glared at her.

“Fine!” She glared right back. “Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

“Fine.” He turned and stalked out, slamming the door hard enough to make her jump.

Jean stood alone in her living room after he left, rigid with fury, clenching her fists hard to keep from breaking something. Anything.

_Dammit! Being a grown up sucks!_

She sat down in the chair hard, cursing Oakley, cursing Joe, and (especially) cursing Alan, _smarmy bastards, all of them!_

*****

Jean refused to go into the office at all over the next week, working from home, spending most evenings with John, and studiously ignoring the intermittent texts from Oakley — these had come fast and furious for a few days before trailing off. She never deleted them, but she wouldn’t read them, either. Avoidance she could do. She had lots of practice in that department. She didn’t know what she would do if Oakley made another late night appearance.

Not until Sunday morning, when no one could get into the building except faculty with building keys, did she finally sneak into her office to pick up a few books and files. She opened the door to a little pile of notes that Oakley had shoved under it.

_Fuck._

She closed the door, gathered them up, and sat on the floor to read them.

They ranged from angry and resentful, to sad and apologetic, to proud and unrepentant. None of them were dated, so it was difficult to tell if there was a progression, or what pattern they progressed through. _Maybe I should look at all those texts._ She sighed.

Friday:

6:00pm [can we talk]

6:05pm [ru there]

6:12pm [hello]

6:26pm [answer ur phone]

6:54pm [I rly think we shld talk]

7:13pm [r u home]

7:21pm [can i come by]

11:48pm [FUCK YOU]

Saturday

12:03am [sorry can i come see u]

3:07pm [so r u not speaking to me anymore]

4:54pm [will u b in ur office monday]

Sunday

2:58pm [will u b in ur office this week]

3:06pm [hello]

She stopped there. Truth be told, Jean got just a little sick to her stomach when she read through them, and she sat staring at the screen until it finally faded to black.

_We should talk._

Her head fell back against the door behind her.

_I really really really don’t want to talk._

She woke up her phone again, and started typing: [do you want to meet at the park this afternoon?]

*****

When she arrived at the park, Oakley was already sitting on a bench.  His elbows rested on his splayed knees, his hands hanging between them.  His back was slouched, his neck bent.  Her heart squeezed briefly as she sat down next to him.

“Oakley…”

“You know what bothers me, _Professor_?” he spat out before she could say anything else.  “You’d already made your decision.  You made it weeks ago and you didn't bother to talk about it with me.  And then you just ignored me.”

“I tried to talk to you about it! Before John even got back. You just kept shrugging and changing the subject.”

“No, you just tried to convince me you were right.  You never cared what I thought.”  He gave that same shrug she'd just referenced.  “I guess you just didn't want this to work, huh?”

_Ouch._ “Oakley, I... of course I care what you think.”  She stared at a leaf on the path, her thoughts scattered in a hundred directions. _I don't want to be here.  I want to tell you — what? What can I possibly say that won’t just sound wrong? Why is that dog off-leash?_   _What would John say?_  “‘This’… this was never going anywhere, you know that.”

“No, I don’t know that,” he growled.  “ _You decided_ that.  From the first time we talked, you had all these reasons why not.  And now you're going to tell me them all again —” he spoke over the beginning of her protest.  “But I don't care.  You have your stupid reasons why you can’t trust me and you’re going to go off and fuck Dr. Ryan because you think he’s _safe_.”

She snorted under her breath at the dramatic flourish Oakley ended with.  “You say ‘safe’ like it’s a bad thing.  You’re setting up a false choice.  It’s not _either_ ‘safe’ _or_ ‘fun.’  Do you know what ‘safe’ is, sweetheart?  _Safe_ is knowing when someone’s coming home.  _Safe_ is sleeping in the same bed, knowing their favorite way to eat eggs, how hot they like their showers.  _Safe_ is being so comfortable with someone that you can take risks, explore new things, and have a solid place to come back to. _Safe_ and _fun_ are not mutually exclusive.”  Jean sighed, rubbing her arms when a stiff breeze drew unexpected goosebumps.

“There you go again, telling me what I can’t do without even asking! I could do that sort of safe.”  His hands waved before balling into fists.

“Well, stop getting so angry and maybe we could talk!  Yes, John is the kind of safe I want — and look at this, Oakley, we can’t get there.  We can't even have one hard conversation.”

Oakley blew air out through his nose, before he stood and shoved his hands in his pockets.  He looked at her, eyes mournfully darting over her face.

“Oh don't look at me like I’m the great love of your life, abandoning you in your hour of need.” She rolled her eyes.  “This isn’t the first time either of us had a break up. You’ll get over me before you even finish the first week of classes.” She smiled crookedly, “What we had was almost all sex, anyway.”  

“Yeah,” Oakley grinned, even if it had a wistful look to it, slapping a hand on her thigh and squeezing hard enough to make her squeal.  “But it was really, really good sex.” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “You won’t forget me any time soon, will you, Palmer?” He planted a smooch on her cheek and strode off.

“Cocky asshole,” she couldn't help but chuckle.  She was going to miss his unshakable confidence in his charm — and she’d bet dollars to donuts that he’d have some gorgeous something on his arm before long. She watched him stroll away slowly, hands still deep in his pockets, head bowed. _Such a nice ass!_   

She sat for another minute, stroking her thumb over the black screen of her phone before she turned it on.

[Hey. Want to skip out of the lab early and get a drink with me?]

[You got it, babe. Where to?]

**Author's Note:**

> Probably the last of this series. I think.


End file.
